Right Side Up or Upside Down
by kohimiruku
Summary: Anzu/Yuugi; rated M for implied sexual content. It's nearly graduation, two years after the group has returned from Egypt and begun to heal their scars. And Anzu begins to see that "the other Yuugi" she always had eyes for wasn't Atem after all... it really was just Yuugi. Yuugi, her closest friend, her confidante...and now, possibly, her lover?


**Title: Right Side Up or Upside Down**

**Pairing: Yuugi Mutou/Anzu Masaki**

**Rating: M for implied sexual situations**

=o=o=o=o=o=

_...Am I right side up or upside down, and is this real, or am I dreaming? _

_Lovely lady, let me drink you, please, I won't spill a drop, no, I promise you._  
_Lying under this spell you cast on me. _  
_Each moment the more, I love you..._

_- Dave Matthews Band, "Crush"_

=o=o=o=o=o=

It's nearly a month until graduation, and Anzu is still staring at Yuugi's profile during class just as she has for the past two years.

Duelist Kingdom is over—so over that no one even remembers it happened; the Millennium Items were restored to their desert birthplace and burial ground years ago.

The great Yuugi Mutou is just Yuugi now, and Anzu is more fascinated by him than ever.

When they all walk home together, she doesn't taste sand in her mouth, or hear "let's duel!" in the back of her mind; she doesn't have to keep herself from looking for Yuugi's eyes a few inches above where they actually are, she doesn't expect to meet cool, knowing scarlet instead of cheerful, bright violet.

Nowadays, if they talk about playing games on the way home, it's something simple like tag, or hide and seek. Miho stopped jumping on Bakura about a year or so ago, and now they're the best of friends. Bakura even lends her his favorite mystery novels, while Miho sets him up on blind dates with her single male friends (the ones that aren't secretly trying to date _her_). Honda and Shizuka hold hands on the way home, and Jounouchi pretends not to notice anymore.

Yuugi and Anzu live the closest together, so they always end up alone on the last leg of the journey. Yuugi always stops to buy them ice creams—chocolate for him, strawberry for Anzu—and they make easy small talk about life. They reach the Game Shop first, but Yuugi always insists on walking Anzu home before doubling back to his own house.

Today, as they reach the familiar yellow building with the cheerful turtle perched on top, Yuugi hesitates, pivoting on one foot to face Anzu and look up at her. Anzu halts as well, startled, and tilts her head as she meets his gaze curiously. "Yuugi? Is something wrong?"

He hesitates again, one hand tugging his backpack strap the way he's done since middle school. "…Would you like to come in?"

Anzu giggles lightly, shaking her head and scrunching up her nose a bit. "Is that it? Of course I will, silly." She laughs again at his nervousness, not yet realizing that the boy hasn't quite relaxed just yet.

"…Anzu?"

"Hm?"

Anzu blinks when she feels a warm, decidedly masculine hand wrap around her wrist, not pulling her forward but just keeping her in place.

"It's just me at home this weekend." Yuugi's voice is quiet and serious.

"Okay…?" Anzu feels confused by his solemn face, and flustered by the way her stomach tightens at feeling his grip warm against her skin.

"Anzu." He shakes her a little. "I'm saying no one else is home….but me and you."

"…Oh," Anzu breathes, her heart hammering. She doesn't make a move one way or the other, her cheeks flushing deeply. She thinks she knows what he's asking—but—does _he_ know what he's asking? Does he know what this will do to their relationship?

(Does he know they have a relationship at all?)

"Well—well let me in, then, you weirdo!" she teases unsteadily, gently tugging her hand free from his grip, though not unkindly. He lets her go easily, his face relaxing into its usual wide smile, and she wonders if she's just imagined the strange tension of the last few moments.

"Whatever!" he sticks his tongue out at her, kicking his shoes off by the front door and tossing his backpack on the couch as he scampers up to his room. "Last one up pays for dinner!" Yuugi shouts gleefully, and Anzu lets out a cry of real dismay as she follows him in socked feet, smirking as her long legs easily beat him. She bounds onto his bed just a few minutes before he gets to the door of his tiny bedroom, pulling a face at her, which she very ungraciously returns, sticking her tongue out just to add insult to injury.

They both collapse in laughter, Yuugi sinking down with his back against the door, one hand to his stomach, while Anzu falls back on his little bed and nearly cries from laughing so hard. "Like you EVER thought you could beat ME!" she taunts him, and he sighs melodramatically, pushing his bangs back from his face as he rises.

"Ah~ I suppose a lady should never really pay for her pizza anyway," he grins, striding over to her and bending at the waist in an exaggerated bow. "Milady, I do heartily vow to never let you degrade yourself in the name of sustenance," he pronounces mock-solemnly, sending Anzu into another fit of giggles.

As she finally rights herself to sit up on the edge of her bed, Yuugi straightens up from his bow, and the laughter dies in her throat as they meet nose to nose, her breath mixing with his in the tiniest of spaces between their mouths.

_Yuugi_, she tries to say, but no sound comes out. She sees his eyes follow her lips as she shapes his name, though, and her stomach tightens all over again when his eyes darken just a fraction.

This had happened once before.

With someone else.

Anzu remembers looking up into almond-shaped, crimson eyes, remembers Atem's hands planted on the tree trunk on either side of her head as he stared at her, stared _into_ her, his breath coming quick and shallow, her throat tight with arousal. He had held her gaze for what felt like hours; his breath had been slightly spiced from the wine they'd had at Shizuka's "homecoming" party when she'd finally moved in with Jounouchi.

Anzu hadn't moved an inch and neither had Atem, and after what seemed an eternity, he'd let out a breath and pulled back, moved away just enough for both of them to breathe in the humid summer night air. They had never spoken of the encounter—feelings weren't something a seventeen-year-old high school student and an ancient pharaoh were accustomed to discussing at length. She's wondered ever since then if she should have said something, if she should have done something.

Now she's sitting on Yuugi's bed, his hands by his sides. Nothing is keeping her there. If she wanted to move away, she could. His breath is still sweetened from the chocolate ice cream, and his face is still so round and childlike. If she wanted to move away, she could do so right now.

Yuugi takes a breath, and pulls back—

-and her hand shoots out seemingly of its own accord, latching onto his wrist with a desperate plea, finally vocalizing his name, albeit softly and in a broken tone. "Yuugi..!"

Anzu doesn't know what she's doing. She can feel his pulse hammering underneath her fingertips; her long, delicate fingers easily close around his thin wrist. She can feel her mouth tremble when she drops her gaze from his eyes to his lips, and in a guilty moment of realization she snaps her gaze back up where it belongs, her breath stuttering in her throat when she finds his own eyes narrowed and nearly black. Her stomach tightens again, tightens _hard_, and she wants to say something, say ANYTHING but his mouth is warm and sweet against hers so she says nothing at all.

Yuugi kisses like he duels, and Anzu supposes she shouldn't be surprised. His kiss is kind and soft but brooks no argument—it's as if he knows he's already won. That infinite patience of his… Anzu wonders if he's been biding his time until this moment. Her heart swells in both guilt and a sudden, sharp surge of affection, and her hands come up to cup his adorable face, her throat tightening a bit with tears that she can't understand. His hands easily settle on the curves of her waist as if they've always belonged there, and Yuugi bites her lip by accident when Anzu shudders in appreciation at his touch, both of them shaking, trembling almost violently, fused together by such an innocent kiss that is so much more than a mere joining of mouths.

They break apart to breathe.

Yuugi's breathing is harsh, ragged, and he suddenly freezes, his eyes almost comically wide as his hands stiffen on Anzu's waist, as if he's suddenly just realized where he'd been touching her. "I—Anzu…" his voice isn't quite a question, but is certainly not steady enough to warrant a statement. Yuugi's brilliant violet eyes look into hers, his expression instantly going from confident to concerned. "Should I…stop?" he ventures, his stance betraying his disappointment at the idea despite his honestly worried voice, and Anzu thinks she's falling in love with him all over again.

(The first time, though she's told no one but Bakura, was the time in ninth grade when Yuugi had given her his fruit cup after she'd gotten a C on a test; she'd thrown her fruit cup at Jounouchi five minutes prior for making fun of her crying over said grade.)

Anzu doesn't say any of this, though, choosing instead to wind her fingers in Yuugi's surprisingly soft black hair and pull him in for another kiss. She doesn't think about where this is going, too afraid that the moment will end, but when Yuugi's leg sneaks in between her thighs, she lets him push her back into his bed, barely big enough to hold one person, let alone two, and Anzu decides to turn off her brain for an hour or three.

=o=o=o=

Anzu is blinking back reflexive tears, trying to breathe properly, feeling too hot all over, her knees somewhere around Yuugi's shoulders as his mouth works at her neck in an attempt to calm himself down. Anzu grips his hair again, shuddering almost violently with a level of pleasure she can't quite comprehend, her breath catching on a sudden whine when Yuugi experimentally twitches his hips. "Can't…" she gasps, burning inside and out, needing something she can't name just yet.

"Why?" Yuugi growls out into her neck, and Anzu tugs him up by his hair to see him better, not understanding.

"What?" she gets out amidst heavy panting, her brow knitting in confusion.

"Why didn't you kiss him?" Yuugi hisses, his eyes round and almost pained, as if he's afraid of the answer he'll receive.

Anzu blinks, momentarily startled back to proper thought before her gaze softens, a small smile gracing her lips as she lets one hand slide down to cup his cheek, her thumb rubbing over the heated skin. "He wasn't you, Yuugi." She sees him open his mouth again to argue her point, and hurriedly talks over him. "My body wanted him, yes, but my heart…didn't know what it wanted." Anzu has always been brutally honest with Yuugi, and she isn't about to lie to him now by saying she knew she was in love with him all those years ago. He seems to appreciate it, though, leaning his cheek into her palm. "And I think Atem knew that. He was a pretty good guy after all, wasn't he."

Yuugi nods, but wrinkles his nose a bit, turning to press a quick kiss to her palm as he shifts his hips again just to make Anzu gasp, his lips curling up in a smirk. "He was, but I'd rather not think about him while I'm inside you."

"_Yuugi!_" Anzu gasps, both scandalized and horribly aroused by his blatant language. She doesn't get a chance to admonish him, though, now that he's picked up a rhythm, so instead she shuts her eyes, cries out into Yuugi's mouth while silently sending up a prayer of thanks to that great Palace in the sky, hoping that her old friend hears only her words and none of the other sounds she's currently making.

"Anzu," Yuugi grits out against her neck, and Anzu loses it entirely, because he's saying her name, Yuugi is calling out _her_ name and it's better than any ice cream, any game of Duel Monsters, better even than her dreams of America.

She lets him carry her into unconsciousness, because in the morning she can watch his profile like she has for years, the sunlight dancing over his cheekbones and in his eyes, and she knows that she will keep watching him in the morning every morning for years and years to come.

=o=o=o=o=o=

**This is my first smutty fic, so please let me know how you felt about it, love or hate, in a review! I actually really like this pairing; I'm far from an Anzu-basher because I really identify with her character. Well, minus the "my best friend who I might like has a really hot ancient pharaoh living inside his puzzle" thing. I love concrit and as always, thanks so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed it!**

**=^..^= kohimiruku**


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